GabriellaSivilla
Governor
THE SCALENE TRIANGLE
Like a bolt from the blue, the bombshell falls on the corps de ballet assembled by Madame Chloé: the Sicilian Romeo, the woman-slayer, has pulled out without any explanation –some female’s ruined him, for sure. What is certain is that we’ve wasted more than a month of rehearsing, and more time will be lost - a primo ballerino cannot just be replaced with another, he’s not a car part, not a component of a film cast, where, if one runs off out of the studios you just look around, see one with a stupid face and ask him: 'Do you want to be Romeo in our movie?', and if he says yes, he’ll be as good as, maybe even better than, the original. But a dancer is a unique creation, one who brings with him all his own style and technical skills. And dancers suitable for this part, performing to this music, you don’t find them round every corner. There are very few really good dancers - it's like replacing Nureyev in the Nutcracker or in Petrushka, where do you find another like Nureyev? Even those who are here in our corps de ballet, and there aren’t many, among us women there are only four men – there are only twenty of us altogether – and they’re young, they’ve not got the personality for such a difficult role.
Madame is in a rage, I expect any moment she’ll come out with a string of blasphemies such as have never before been heard. I pluck up courage, get up, approach her, she makes a gesture as if she wants me to go away, but then we hug, she starts crying, and I do too.
But we can’t cancel everything just because of an arrogant oaf who first makes promises and then breaks his word, we must start looking for someone right away. Time’s been wasted, but not entirely, we’ve all already worked on our part, we already know it all through, the music, the steps, the scenes. The search won’t be easy at this stage, we have to find a star who’s not already been snapped up. The Italian men, as far as I know, are all already booked, and for some time, here or overseas, there are only a few possibilities, foreigners, who’ve hardly been heard of, and what we have heard we can’t judge how reliable.
Like a bolt from the blue, the bombshell falls on the corps de ballet assembled by Madame Chloé: the Sicilian Romeo, the woman-slayer, has pulled out without any explanation –some female’s ruined him, for sure. What is certain is that we’ve wasted more than a month of rehearsing, and more time will be lost - a primo ballerino cannot just be replaced with another, he’s not a car part, not a component of a film cast, where, if one runs off out of the studios you just look around, see one with a stupid face and ask him: 'Do you want to be Romeo in our movie?', and if he says yes, he’ll be as good as, maybe even better than, the original. But a dancer is a unique creation, one who brings with him all his own style and technical skills. And dancers suitable for this part, performing to this music, you don’t find them round every corner. There are very few really good dancers - it's like replacing Nureyev in the Nutcracker or in Petrushka, where do you find another like Nureyev? Even those who are here in our corps de ballet, and there aren’t many, among us women there are only four men – there are only twenty of us altogether – and they’re young, they’ve not got the personality for such a difficult role.
Madame is in a rage, I expect any moment she’ll come out with a string of blasphemies such as have never before been heard. I pluck up courage, get up, approach her, she makes a gesture as if she wants me to go away, but then we hug, she starts crying, and I do too.
But we can’t cancel everything just because of an arrogant oaf who first makes promises and then breaks his word, we must start looking for someone right away. Time’s been wasted, but not entirely, we’ve all already worked on our part, we already know it all through, the music, the steps, the scenes. The search won’t be easy at this stage, we have to find a star who’s not already been snapped up. The Italian men, as far as I know, are all already booked, and for some time, here or overseas, there are only a few possibilities, foreigners, who’ve hardly been heard of, and what we have heard we can’t judge how reliable.
Last edited by a moderator: